David Calvert

He was elected to Craigavon Borough Council in 1973,^[2] and held his seat until he stood down in 1989.^[3]

He stood for the party in Fermanagh and South Tyrone at the Northern Ireland Constitutional Convention election in 1975, but was not elected.^[4]

He then moved to Armagh, which he contested at the 1979 UK general election, but took only 8.6% of the vote.^[5]

In the early 1980s, Calvert was Deputy Chairman of the DUP,^[6] and in the 1982 Northern Ireland Assembly election, he won a seat.^[5] In 1987, he was seriously injured in an assassination attempt on his life by the Irish National Liberation Army, but recovered fully.^[7] The INLA had also tried to kill him in 1981.^[8] He fell out with the DUP in 1993, in a dispute over candidate selection, and was expelled from the party.^[9]

Calvert stood as an independent candidate in Craigavon at the 2001 local elections, and narrowly missed taking a seat. He stood again in 2005, without success.^[10] In 2006, he attended a meeting of critics of the Belfast Agreement, addressed by Robert McCartney of the UK Unionist Party,^[9] but at the 2007 Assembly election he stood as an independent again, this time in Upper Bann, taking 3.1% of the vote.^[11]

Following the elections, Calvert joined Traditional Unionist Voice, and stood for the party in a by-election to Craigavon Borough Council in January 2010, taking a distant second place.^[12]